Queen's Artist

Mywifesson made an amazing review on the context behind this manga and it made me appreciate it a whole lot more than right after I finished reading it. The story talks about a young mangaka and his teacher, a former mangaka, and their collaboration to draw a good manga. The teacher is Watashiya Kaoru's self insert (the mangaka for Joou-sama no Eshi AND her hit piece Kodomo no Jikan). She breaks the fourth wall a lot by telling her struggles with Kodomo no Jikan and after it got published overseas. I think this context makes the manga incredibly fascinating, to see the point of viewof the author and her displease over how things were handled with her controversial series. For the manga itself, 2 years can make a big difference but I feel like the quality difference between volume 2 and 3 is insane. The first 2 volumes felt slow and genuinely directionless. It felt like the storyline had nowhere to go neither did the characters. However, starting from volume 3 it almost did a full 360. Shifting focus from the young high school protagonist to the teacher. The inclusion of their finished mangas and the development of the girls were great as well. I feel like volumes 1-2 and 3-4 felt almost like 2 different mangas. The quality shot up not only in art but in story, characters, comedy, and pacing. Sadly, I felt like those two first volumes were just so lackluster the last two didn't make up for it. I wish there was a couple more volumes of this after those last two.

This manga features three high school students and their teacher working on a manga together. There are many manga that have a similar premise, but this one is pretty unique. For one, all four of them are equally important. And yes, that includes the teacher. He's actually more of a focus than any of the students, seeing as he's a former professional mangaka, and this is essentially the story of him getting back into the swing of things. But to be clear, there isn't any main protagonist, and each of the four gets their own stories. Furthermore, the manga they're creating is an eromanga, which isn'tall that special in and of itself, but this manga handles things in a unique way. Firstly, the writing is much more bitter about eromanga and the manga industry in general than I've seen in any other similar manga. Which makes a lot of sense, seeing as it's by Watashiya Kaworu not long after she was put through the wringer due to censorship and similar issues regarding Kodomo no Jikan. Secondly, despite it being about a group creating an eromanga, the group is composed of two men and two women instead of the harem dynamic typical to such situations. Furthermore, while there are a few hints at romance involving the men early on, it fizzles out quickly and is not something the manga is about at all. Overall, this manga is incredibly interesting from beginning to end. The mangaka is really good at keeping the story engrossing, even when nothing is really happening, by finding something attention grabbing to throw in there. For example, this manga actually fully includes a few of the in-universe manga, and they're really good oneshots. The mangaka is also completely unafraid of taking things in completely unexpected directions that other mangaka never would. The problem is that stuff like that is only good in the moment. Each chapter is entertaining, and some have solid, deep messaging. But holistically, the manga doesn't really go anywhere. The actual plot threads, character arcs, and relationship arcs all feel kind of half-assed. If this were purely a gag manga, then that would be fine, but this manga actually has a lot of depth. It's just that there's never really any proper payoff to anything. That leaves the ending pretty unsatisfying, and the manga overall feels kind of hollow. The art is excellent in style and quality, starting out good and getting even better as the manga progresses. It's also used incredibly well with lots of fantastic character art. tl;dr: A manga that's definitely interesting, but not quite good.